In a collaborative effort between the Pacific Islands Global Climate Observing System (PI-GCOS) and the Pacific Rainfall Project (PACRAIN) at the University of Oklahoma, a series of tipping bucket rain gauges with data loggers have been installed on a number of Pacific islands. To date, 50 gauges have been sent to The Cook Islands, Guam, Kiribati, Niue, Samoa, Tonga, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu. The gauges with data loggers enable the island Meteorological Services to obtain rainfall measurements in remote areas, as well as to obtain rainfall measurements with high temporal resolution.

The primary advantage of these gauges is that they can be deployed and maintained by a relatively small meteorological service. In addition, these gauges are being field tested along side manual read gauges at various Pacific locals.

Many of these gauges have now been deployed for over a year. The gauges and data loggers have presented both rewards and challenges to the Pacific island meteorological services. This presentation will discuss the value of using automated equipment in developing countries with limited resources, as well as the problems that have been encountered.